The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike) Part 1873 by Angharad Copyright © 2012 Angharad All Rights Reserved.

I slept rather badly that night, or more accurately, I couldn’t get off to sleep worrying about Phoebe. She was extremely vulnerable and I didn’t want her exposed to any unnecessary stress. If she wanted to take a few days off college, I’d happily phone them for her.

I tossed and turned again as Simon snored and slept like a log, nothing keeps him awake–or seems to. I on the other hand, worry about everything and nothing. I know, I’m neurotic but that’s the way I am. Then I remembered I had to prepare something for talking to my old school–oh boy, what joy that would be.

At two in the morning, I think I must have finally gone to sleep and I woke when Simon went in the shower and tried to stay awake so I wouldn’t oversleep. It was Monday again and time to get the girls up.

I showered myself trying to wake up but it was hopeless. I dried myself, dressed in jeans and sweat shirt and called the various children to get up. Then I went down and even swallowed a cup of Tom’s coffee to try and wake myself up. It didn’t. Instead I had to rush to the loo and throw up, then dash to the bathroom to clean my teeth. By the time I came down again, Jacqui and Stella had taken charge and everyone was being fed and watered except me.

I glanced at everyone and Phoebe was eating toast and helping Puddin’ with some cereal at the same time. The very thought of it made me want to puke again. Puddin’ with a mouth like a cement mixer full of a mixture of milk and coco pops sent me off to the cloakroom again. I was back ten minutes later.

“Did you find him?” asked Stella.

“Who?”

“Hughie, we heard you calling him.” She laughed and went back to sorting the children from where she looked back and said, “Not morning sickness is it?”

“Very funny,” I said, meaning the exact opposite; sometimes her humour could be rather cruel, and today was a case in point. I went upstairs again to brush my teeth and rid myself of the awful taste of vomit. I drank a glass of water and hoped it would stay down. It seemed to. I felt able to drive the girls to school and Phoebe to college, so at half past eight that’s what I did.

Having ditched the littlies, Phoebe was able to tell me that she felt okay and she would cope. She apologised again for yesterday and thanked me for being there. Then, she went in through the college entrance along with dozens of other students and I drove home feeling ravenous.

I ate some toast and drank a cup of tea with no ill effects, so quite what had happened was a total enigma to me–unless I’d eaten something and now my stomach had voided it, I was okay. But all I’d eaten was that sandwich from the filling station. I’d had tuna, Trish had had cheese and coleslaw. Perhaps it was the sandwich–mild food poisoning, or just me becoming neurotic or more so than usual. The irony being, that Phoebe was now over her loss and back to normal, while I was a total wreck.

On the pretext of doing some preparation for the school talk, I went to my study and promptly fell asleep at my desk. “Why don’t you go back to bed, Mummy?” asked Catherine.

Eh? I looked again and she entered with Jacquie who’d brought me a cup of tea and a biscuit. “I can’t, sweetheart, I have to sort out some figures for tomorrow.”

“Just make ’em up, everyone else does. Did you know that sixty nine per cent of statistics are fabricated?”

“No, who told you that?”

“No one, I made it up–why don’t you do the same?”

“Because it’s the sort of school where if I made a mistake, it would be all over the internet tomorrow.”

“How much are they paying you?”

“Nothing as far as I know.”

“Well then, tell then your accuracy improves with payment.”

“No way, I’m trying to get their students interested in studying biology or ecology, preferably at Portsmouth.”

“You’re recruiting?”

“Yeah, that’s the payback for us.”

“But you’re not being paid?”

“There are more things in heaven and earth than in your philosophy.”

“Show off, Poor Yorick.”

“Aye, alas, poor Yorick indeed. Now I’m awake I feel much better and I’m sure I can knock something together for my old school.”

“You went to Bristol Grammar School?”

“Yeah, a long time ago.”

“I always assumed you went to a public school.”

“No–but it was an independent fee paying school, so it was like a day school and the council gave us so much towards the cost of my fees and my dad had to find the rest. Academically, it was very good–we had loads of kids go to Oxbridge.”

“But they humiliated you?”

“Not really–well okay–some of them did, some of them were okay. It would have happened wherever I went and in some ways I invited trouble by having long hair like a girl and refusing to have it cut. I suppose I was also a bit feminine in my mannerisms and with my squeaky, high pitched voice and no facial or body hair, I must have looked like a girl who went through the wrong door.”

“That’s a good description, a girl who went through the wrong door–yeah, that’s very clever. You are very clever, aren’t you?”

“No I’m not, if you want to see cleverness, watch Trish. I’m just average.”

“No you’re not. Mrs Average doesn’t have a first class honours degree, a masters degree and in a week or so, a doctoral degree. Nor could she write books and direct a film as well as star in it and write the script. I’m willing to bet she couldn’t run this place either, not the way you do.”

“Okay, you guessed it, my secret identity, I’m Wonder Woman, only I gave up the corset as too passé.”

She looked at me and roared with laughter. “You are so funny, Mummy.”

“I am?” I shook my head and she left me to write my talk while she walked away laughing.

Lunch was next and David made some soup into which he added some pasta, and that was lunch, soup with pasta, a sort of thick minestrone without the noodles–perhaps it was eaten by noodles, who knows.

I got down enough ideas to be able to talk through the survey mechanism, the checks and audits and the people who did that, plus a quick introduction to ecology. I would talk for an hour to three months depending upon whether they can shut me up successfully or not. Once the blue touch paper is lit, I’m off like a rocket, spreading my knowledge, sharing my enthusiasm and I hope, convincing my audience that this world is worth protecting and conserving, and the best way to save species is to conserve the habitats in which they live against all the conflicting pressures to which they are subjected in these difficult times.

On a good day, I can speak with wit and passion. If I manage to hit both targets I’ll send them off understanding and primed to ask awkward questions of the adults they know, and that’s how we educate the adults–through pressure from above via the media and from below through their children, who I hope will catch the bug and want to study with me at Portsmouth. Not too ambitious is it?